American Sniper has dominated the domestic box office in the three weeks since its wide release, but its reign will end this weekend. That said, it’s not going down without a fight.
SpongeBob Squarepants and his friends have come to topple the American Sniper juggernaut, after The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water grossed an impressive $15 million on Friday. This is actually only $2 million shy of the opening day take of box office juggernaut The LEGO Movie, which opened on the same weekend last year. Though SpongeBob is not expected to match LEGO‘s $69 million opening weekend haul, Paramount still has to be smiling. This is particularly impressive for a sequel to a movie that opened over a decade ago. Obviously, SpongeBob has staying power.
Sponge Out of Water appears to be capitalizing on the current appeal of comic book superhero movies, by having SpongeBob and his cohorts invade the human world and take on superhero powers to battle a nefarious pirate played by Antonio Banderas. A similar tactic – taking a 2D cartoon and translating into 3D, set in the “real world” – worked for The Smurfs in 2011.
Meanwhile, the real battle is for second place. The Wachowskis‘ new sci-fi extravaganza, Jupiter Ascending, took in an estimated $6.39 million on Friday, good enough for second place, but American Sniper was hot on its heels with $6.26 million. Jupiter sees the Wachowski siblings creating their first original, non-sequel, non-adaptation movie since the original The Matrix debuted in 1999. They have struggled at the box office since the Matrix trilogy ended, however; their previous two films, Speed Racer and Cloud Atlas, both flopped. After delaying Jupiter from last summer, Warner Bros. is hoping for an opening weekend in the low $20 million range, which seems possible, though critics have not been kind to Jupiter.
Read our review: JUPITER ASCENDING REVIEW: It’s Phantom Menace All Over Again
After numerous production delays, Universal’s Seventh Son has finally been released three years after principal photography began, but the fantasy adventure starring Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore only pulled in $2.3 million on Friday. It will be exceedingly lucky if it hits $10 million over the weekend. The critics have been harsh; Seventh Son currently sits at a dismal 10% on Rotten Tomatoes, though our review was much more kind.
Read our review: SEVENTH SON REVIEW: If J.K. Rowling Wrote D&D Campaigns
Box office figures via Box Office Mojo